I think Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia should stick to law and refrain from making theological pronouncements.
Last Saturday while speaking at Archbishop Rummel High School in Metairie, Louisiana, this “puffed up” justice (to use a New Testament phrase to describe him) said that God has been good to America because Americans have honored him.
“God has been very good to us. That we won the revolution was extraordinary. The Battle of Midway was extraordinary. I think one of the reasons God has been good to us is that we have done him honor. Unlike the other countries of the world that do not even invoke his name we do him honor.”
Some commentators were rightly disturbed by the implications for church/state relations in Scalia’s remark, but I was much more aghast at the image of God he articulated.
For Scalia God is apparently a divine judge who hands out curses and blessings according to how people behave. Be good and you get divine kindness. Be bad and you get divine wrath.
That’s the image of God you find in the Book of Deuteronomy. Moses tells his people if they obey God when they go into the land God will bless them, but if they disobey God they will be cursed.
Thank God (no pun intended) the Book of Job debunks that kind of theology. In the story Job is a good man who lives a righteous life and still gets the shaft by life. His suffering is completely undeserved.
In fact, the mythical wager God and Satan make at the beginning of the book has Satan affirming the Deuteronomic ethic of blessings and curses and God rejecting it.
Maybe Scalia quit reading the Bible after he finished Deuteronomy and never got to the Book of Job, or ever took the time to read Rabbi Harold Kushner’s bestselling book, When Bad Things Happen To Good People.
It is truly stunning that a Supreme Court Justice would say such a thing to high school kids who have probably already learned from the ambiguities of life that such silly theology doesn’t hold up under scrutiny. But there’s more.
Recently Scalia agreed with “those who contend that it does not benefit African Americans to get them into the University of Texas, where they do not do well, as opposed to having them go to a less-advanced school, a slower-track school where they do well.”
Apparently he believes black students “deserve” a better chance of succeeding by attending schools where they are not, in his words, “pushed ahead in classes that are too fast for them.”
But none of this should surprise us. After all, Scalia is a “constitutional fundamentalist” who believes he can determine the “original intent” of the founders.
That’s the way Christian fundamentalists approach the Bible. They insist they know the “original intent” of the biblical writers. Scalia probably agrees with them on that as well, what with the confidence he has in his own powers of “divination.”
Given the state of the nation where our government cannot function and the presidential race is dominated by Republican candidates whose views can only be described as uniformed, ignorant, racist, incendiary, or absurd, the last thing we need is a Supreme Court Justice undermining confidence in the high court’s ability to reason fairly and justly, or perhaps to reason at all.
I said at the beginning that Scalia should stick to law and refrain from making theological pronouncements.
But that may not be enough. Better yet might be for him to resign before he does further damage to his already tarnished legal legacy and takes the Court down with him.
linnposts.com 
Scalia’s view of God as a Divine Judge is the same concept as is in Islam, except Islam carries it one step further to eternal burning in Hell if you disobey any of Allah’s (and Islam’s) huge array of rules. I vaguely recall from my Sunday School days that we were taught a similar concept in a Lutheran church about burning in Hell. Was it maybe a ploy to make us behave a little better?
Wally, it was, and, of course, it failed, as we all know quite well, including Scalia, making his Sunday School theology all the more disturbing.
Thanks Jan. Well said.
Thanks, Wilbur.
Jan, pardon me, please, for borrowing a paragraph from your column:
“…Recently Scalia agreed with “those who contend that it does not benefit African Americans to get them into the University of Texas, where they do not do well, as opposed to having them go to a less-advanced school, a slower-track school where they do well.”…”
Even from my side of the pond, I’d read of the Supreme Court decision in the case of Sweatt v. Painter (1948), in which the concept that ‘lower standards for non-whites are good enough’, was challenged head-on – and overthrown. Really, a judge of Scalia’s standing ought to read some more of the decisions of the body of which he’s a member. The bad ones as well as the good ones.
And as for this doctrine of ‘original intent’ he’s so much in favour of, I’ve just had a great idea. One that’ll really make the 2nd Amendment work. Everyone should be allowed to have a gun – but only of the kind in use when your country’s constitution was drawn up (1789, I believe?). That means only muzzle loading guns, and nothing else.
Now, that ought to please the NRA…
You are right on target with your suggestion that muzzle-loaders should be th only guns permissible. It fits Scalia’s Constitutional philosophy perfectly.
Cheerz!
Gene, his “constitutional philosophy” is a moving target actually. Whatever suits his argument is it.
Nigel, you’re too logical and reasonable to please the NRA, or Scalia, or any of the conservatives we now have here at home. It’s a strange world in the U.S. at the moment.
Jan,
I am glad you have the Biblical knowledge and theological perspective to call-out Scalia for the pompous ass and flawed SC Justice that he is. His absurd positions on many things (esp. race) have long bothered me, but I did not have your informed wisdom to state the essence of his ineptitude. Thanks!
One thing’s for sure, Bill, we’re talking about the same person. Only our descriptions are different.